---
title: Anarchist in the Library, Siva Vaidhyanathan
date: '2006-05-10'
tags:
- personal
draft: false
legacy_url: https://lu.is/2006/05/anarchist-in-the-library-siva-vaidhyanathan/
legacy_source: wordpress
---

I just finished [Anarchist in the Library](http://www.librarything.com/card_card.php?work=106535), by Siva Vaidhyanathan. I probably wasn't the right target for this book- too many of the arguments and discussions were pretty old hat to me.  It did cover a much broader range than the average info-policy book, but it didn't seem to tie them all that coherently together, unfortunately. That said, the book did attempt to provide an interesting analytical framework- to grotesquely over-simplify, the balance between anarchy and oligarchy. It is a reasonable way of looking at the world- certainly it offers the possibility of tying together into a single narrative such things as the NSA's Total Information Awareness, slashdot trolls, and Big Entertainment's DRM. As a result, overall, I'm glad I read the book- this might be a useful mental tool. But if you read the other usual suspects in info-policy, don't buy the book- just find a copy and read the intro and the final chapter. The rest will fall into place without reading the intervening chapters. :)